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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22400233">a hole in the ground, deep in the woods</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/cjones7/pseuds/cjones7'>cjones7</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Riverdale (TV 2017)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Blossoms are there own warning, Child Abuse, Drugging, F/F, Gaslighting, Imprisonment, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Not a ship fic, Power Imbalance, Psychological Horror, Revenge, Ships just mentioned, Threesome only exists in cheryl's horny brain, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, implied to be normal for Blossoms but not like in reality, murder mention</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-01-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 02:40:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,342</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22400233</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/cjones7/pseuds/cjones7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Cheryl worries Toni thinks she’s cheating. Cheryl almost wishes she was. Cheating would be so very much easier to explain than--this.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Cheryl Blossom/Toni Topaz, Cheryl Blossom/Veronica Lodge/Toni Topaz</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>49</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>a hole in the ground, deep in the woods</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I can't actually remember if Toni knows Penelope is captive in the sex bunker or not but I decided for purposes of this fic it was way more fun if she didn't, for angst purposes.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Toni doesn’t know. That’s what sticks at Cheryl, a burr in her hair after running full speed through the woods like some kind of base wild animal, that Toni doesn’t know. Toni knows she slips out, sneaks out, takes care not to be followed. Cheryl is sure of this. Toni is not a stupid girl. Cheryl worries Toni thinks she’s cheating, meeting some other girl, meeting some man, meeting some anyone, behind her back. Cheryl almost wishes she was. Cheating would be so very much easier to explain than--this. But Toni allows Cheryl her secrets, at least until they become too big to keep.</p>
<p>Cheryl likes several things about working with Veronica Lodge. First, foremost, and pettiest, her dead daddy dearest would have hated the very idea of it. That idea is enough to send a shiver running down Cheryl’s spine, even if the Lodge girl weren’t such a delicious little thing to look at, and she so very is. If she were to ask Toni--but best not mix business and pleasure in the first place. The Lodge girl is clever, a good head for business when Cheryl’s flies off in the clouds. But at the moment; the very best thing about doing business with Veronica Lodge, is if she asks for a batch of some drug enough to scramble the minds of a hundred grown men, she can tap into daddy Lodge’s supply line with nary a blip. A smile crawls across her cherry red lips as she stirs the drug into her big pot of soup.</p>
<p>Cheryl takes provisions for a week. At first she wanted to visit every day; make the woman totally dependent on her; give her a taste of a medicine Cheryl has had shoved down her throat her entire life, but quickly found she couldn’t stomach it. Found she needed the separation as much as it heightened her prisoner’s desperation.</p>
<p>She has developed a routine; every Sunday. She makes the provisions; gathers the few non homemade things, harder to seep her poison into; harder but not impossible; gathers them into a basket, dons a red cloak, steps out into the dark woods. It gives her a certain satisfaction, being a Red Riding Hood who has captured her Wolf and held it at her mercy. A fitting end for any fairy tale, she thinks.</p>
<p>It is not a long walk to the bunker, if you know the way. Cheryl knows. And Cheryl knows Toni knows. That Toni could discover, if she wanted. Discover this how she discovered Jason. Cheryl is sure she will, one day. But Toni’s killed a man for her, now. She would not, could not, leave her now. Bonds shared in spilled blood are more binding than those writ by the law. Cheryl knew that before she could walk. She can only hope Toni knows too.</p>
<p>Cheryl never knocks on the bunker hatch. She wants her prisoner as disoriented as possible. The sudden bright light and presence of Cheryl never, ever fails to startle her. Cheryl has developed a routine in this, too. She grabs the woman roughly by the shoulder and leans her forehead against her prisoner’s, grinning wildly and says in a voice full to the brim of arsenic laced cheer,</p>
<p>“Good morning Mommy Dearest. Did you miss me?” Penelope does not respond, so Cheryl digs her nails into the fragile skin between her shoulder and her neck. “Mommy, now, I asked you a question. It is so very rude not to answer me. I am doing such hard work in providing for you, you know.” Cheryl says, half breathless.</p>
<p>Penelope replies, mostly inaudible, and Cheryl prompts her not to mumble with another sharp jab from her nails. “Why don’t you just kill me?” she repeats, loud enough to hear, her voice not yet as dead as Cheryl would like.</p>
<p>“I don’t know Mother. Why didn’t you drown Jason and I when we were born? I know you were told to.” Cheryl counters, voice still high pitched and jovial, as if talking to a child.</p>
<p>“I wanted to keep you. I had made you, you were mine to do as I wanted with. I wanted to mold you.” Penelope says, and Cheryl cannot tell if she is too lost in the haze of the drugs to lie, or if it’s another attempt at subterfuge.</p>
<p>“Maybe that’s it. Maybe I want to mold you.”</p>
<p>“You don’t want to mold me, devil girl. You want me to suffer.” Penelope says and oh it is so much truer than she knows.</p>
<p>“Perhaps I do want you to suffer. Perhaps this is the last time I come, and I will let you starve to death alone down here in the dark.”</p>
<p>Penelope rolls her eyes. “You won’t do that. What is the point in my suffering if you’re not here to witness it?”</p>
<p>“Well then go back to my question mother. You killed all those people--”</p>
<p>“Men.” Penelope cuts in, insistent.</p>
<p>“Yes. You killed all those men. Men are people...most of them, at any rate. But you did not kill me. And you could have. I’m not the last Blossom; the twins will carry the line. But instead you play your little games with your lost brothers and your little dolls. Perhaps I insist on keeping you for the same reasons you were keeping me.” Cheryl counters.</p>
<p>Penelope has no answer for this. Instead, she says: “You are putting something in my food.”</p>
<p>Cheryl sees no reason to lie. “Yes.”</p>
<p>“Will it kill me?”</p>
<p>“No. Or at least, not that I know of. That’s not the point of it.”</p>
<p>“And what is the point, then?” Penelope all but growls.</p>
<p>“What do you see, when I’m not here?” Cheryl asks, curious.</p>
<p>“...part of you is always here. You and Jason and that girl of yours. Giggling in the shadows. And your father--” and Penelope cuts off, unwilling to give away too much. Cheryl doesn’t mind. That was more than enough.</p>
<p>“That’s the point, then. You tried to drive me mad. I’m returning the favor. And unlike you, I’ll succeed. Because when a creature gets strong enough it will always eat its mother. You taught me that. Every Blossom girl is taught that.” Cheryl says, with such finality.</p>
<p>“And is that what you’re teaching the twins?”</p>
<p>“I am not their mother.”</p>
<p>“But you raise them. That’s what matters. As you devour me, you shall be devoured the same.” Penelope hisses, grinning like some wild creature.</p>
<p>“....Maybe so. And yet. You will not be here to see it.” Cheryl says, not betraying her unsettlement.</p>
<p>“You will not leave until you see me eat something, will you?”</p>
<p>“I will not.”</p>
<p>“I could force it out of me when you leave.” Penelope challenges.</p>
<p>“And would you truly stoop to something so undignified?” Cheryl asks. Penelope does not answer. They both know the answer is no. Instead they sit there in silence until Penelope’s hunger gets the better of her, and she tears into a bowl of soup like some starved beast. Cheryl watches, expressionless, until she is finished. They sit a while together, in silence. Penelope could make a move to leave, but she won’t. Not after last time. She doesn’t even need to be chained anymore. She is making progress, though Cheryl can admit, to herself, that she does not know what the end goal may be.</p>
<p>“Best be getting going before dark. You don’t know what roams these woods.” Penelope says after a long moment of silence.</p>
<p>“Oh yes I do. I roam these woods.” She says.</p>
<p>And at that, Cheryl gathers her now empty basket, and turns to go. Penelope calls out, and Cheryl does not turn. Penelope gasps at something only she can see in the shadows, and Cheryl ascends the ladder. She is going back, back to warmth, and home, and family. Back to the twins, back to Toni. Her secrets will be here again in a weeks time, when she needs them. For now she has the woods, and the walk home.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I was folding laundry and suddenly thought: "well, what does Cheryl do with Penelope in the bunker, anyways?" And well, now we have this. The Blossoms are so much more fun when they're deranged.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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